Adam Kirkland

My name is Adam Kirkland. I am a Film Studies graduate from Sheffield Hallam University. My aim is to become a full-time video game and film critic. My favourite games are: Super Mario World, Bully & Alan Wake and my favourite films are: Lethal Weapon, The Thing & Disturbia, these lists are known to constantly rotate between 10 or so titles.

8.5

Great

I never expected to be reviewing the latest Star Wars film, and in some ways I am an unconventional choice. Star Wars was not a fixture in my childhood and it was not until the Playstation 2 and Xbox video game era that I had my first Star Wars experiences, playing; Knights of the Old Republic, Battlefront & Republic Commando. I always dismissed Star Wars as childish but these games offered a...[Read More]

Fair

Christmas is that most special time of year where we come together as family and friends and celebrate peace on Earth and goodwill to all men. Unfortunately, life sometimes gets in the way of this and we need Hollywood to remind us of the true meaning of Christmas. The Christmas film has become a mainstay in our festive celebrations. We all have our favourites that we watch every year that give u...[Read More]

Great

A lone wanderer traverses a vast, arid, post-apocalyptic wasteland with only a dog and his car, the Pursuit Special V8 Interceptor, for company. Mad Max is a film franchise seemingly tailor-made for video game adaptations, yet before 2015 there had been only one Mad Max video game released for the Nintendo Entertainment system in 1990. However, the Mad Max franchise was so influential that we have...[Read More]

Amazing

The teen-horror film is a cinematic sub-genre that despite its celluloid popularity over the last forty years has seen very few video game adaptations. The premise seems ripe for video game exploration, a group of young people encounter a monster (supernatural or otherwise) and are picked off one-by-one, usually whilst staying overnight in a charnel house of some sorts. Very few cinematic trends s...[Read More]

Good

The history of boxing on film is a long and respectable one. The first sports events ever filmed were boxing matches and boxing matches were amongst the first events that filmmakers wanted to capture on film. The sport lends itself extremely well to cinematic drama and over-the-years we have seen many great boxing films on our cinema screens. From the classics of cinema’s golden era such as Kid Ga...[Read More]

Fair

The marvel cinematic universe is a juggernaut existing in its own sub-genre. The films have transcended the medium of comic books as the superhero film became its own cinematic entity. The marvel films are no longer marketed towards comic book fans, their popularity and low barrier to entry has seen them gain a widespread fan-base that comic books never had. In the past, if somebody wished to unde...[Read More]

Bad

The original Ted film released in 2012 came as somewhat a surprise, undoubtedly anybody that has seen an episode of Family Guy could see that creator Seth MacFarlane was heavily influenced by films and most likely had his sights set on Hollywood all along but with Ted, MacFarlane demonstrated that he could sustain his brand of humour for an entire feature length film. Ted was a great debut, sure i...[Read More]

Amazing

The 2009 release of Batman: Arkham Asylum was a revelation. Gamers were so used to licensed games being average at best, soulless cash-ins at worst, often capitalising on trends or exploiting an existing fan base to make some quick money. Nobody expected little-known developer Rocksteady Studios to create such a comprehensive and faithful video game adaptation of the Batman universe. Two years lat...[Read More]

During the fourth, fifth and sixth generation of gaming consoles, publisher Square were the Gods of the gaming world and the rock-stars of the Japanese-Role-Playing-Game. The sheer quality and quantity of amazing titles they put out, was honestly staggering. In the five-year period of 1997-2002 the amount of iconic video games they gave us, was an embarrassment of riches. In 2003 Square merged wit...[Read More]

In all of my infinite wisdom, prior to E3 I had decided that Electronic Arts and Ubisoft were my two most anticipated press conferences. I figured that by now both publishers must be aware of their negative image amongst gamers and that this year’s E3 would be the perfect platform for them to win some trust back and get gamers back on their side. After all E3 is an industry trade show aimed at the...[Read More]

2015 marks the twentieth year of E3 (the Electronic Entertainment Expo), this year marks the first time video game publisher Bethesda have held their own press conference. All the talk beforehand has been centred around questions of whether Bethesda had the clout and gaming library to compete with the bigger name publishers on a stage like E3, based on last night’s press conference, the answer is ...[Read More]

Good

In 1993 I was eight years old, naturally as an eight year old I was obsessed with Jurassic Park before I had even seen the film. I had all of the merchandise; action figures, clothing, video games, even a Jurassic Park stationary set, if it had Jurassic Park plastered all over it, I wanted it. Just as Star Wars before it, Jurassic Park was the defining film franchise of its generation, it was such...[Read More]